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A Good Man Is Hard to Find (1955)

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Submitted By nika6000
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In Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find", romanticism is the main theme reflected in this story. In this short story, we see O'Connor's views on American values and ideas of romanticism. She supports and refutes the ideas of Edwards, Emerson and Thoreau throughout this short story. O'Connor's idea of respect as an American value is shown with the grandmother and the children's differences and similarities. The grandmother values of respect are shown when she tells her daughter-in-law how her children should act which is respectful and obedient.
“In my time,’ She said, the grandmother, folding her thin veined finger, “children were more respectful of their native states and their parents and everything else” (O'Connor225). At the same time the grandmother is hypocritical being that she also disrespected others just like the children. This is showing how O'Connor supports and refutes the American value of respect. Jonathan Edwards' view was that God is very revengeful and bad things happen to bad people. When the grandmother heard the gun shots, she knew she was going to be murdered.
Although she keeps praying it didn't make up for the cruel things she said toward others. The only reason she was praying is so that she would be saved, not because she felt bad for what she did. God did nothing to help her, she was being punished and he had no remorse towards her. God showed that he didn't want anything to do with her and felt no kind of love toward her. In this way O'Connor supports the ideas of Edwards.
Thoreau states that each person has to produce according to his own ability, without striving to imitate another.
He urges the reader to be bold and unafraid to voice their inner thoughts to the world at large. The character the Misfit, shows how O' Connor does somewhat agree with the ideas of Thoreau. The Misfit relies only on himself and follows what

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